


Good Cop, Bad Cop

by DJLiopleurodon, readithoney



Category: Almost Human, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types, The Avengers - Ambiguous Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fusion, Angry!John, Clint!Whump, Crossover, Deaf Clint, Dystopia, Episode: s01e11 Disrupt, Established Relationship, Gen, Gratuitous Interrogation, Hacking, Technology, Undercover, Useful!Rudy, the wall - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-03-02
Updated: 2014-08-09
Packaged: 2018-01-14 06:55:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 20,572
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1257016
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DJLiopleurodon/pseuds/DJLiopleurodon, https://archiveofourown.org/users/readithoney/pseuds/readithoney
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"From their perspective, we are the terrorists."</p><p>Clint and Natasha (Hawkeye and Black Widow) navigate the 2048 landscape from both sides of the wall while John Kennex and Dorian patrol the city and keep the "peace."</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Sotto Voce by DJLiopleurodon

**Author's Note:**

> Avengers fans: Why aren't you watching Almost Human? Go! Watch it. Now! We'll wait. 
> 
> Ok. Back? Good. Read on.
> 
> Almost Human fans: Meet Clint and Natasha. They like to shoot things.

"Could these two look any more like cops?"

Clint's laugh buzzed mechanically. "I made them before they hit the door. What took you so long?"

"I'm hanging upside down up in the rafters." The Sotto Voce completely failed to capture her sardonic tone, but he heard it anyway.

"Point taken." He scratched at the sub-vocalizer patch on his throat with the nock of an arrow. Sixteen hours in and sweat and stubble were taking their toll on the filmy component.

Natasha winced as the device tried to interpret the motion as sound. She made a note to insist on better filtering. If she had to keep listening to it try to make sense of her partner's every hem, shift and cough, she was going to smother him in his sleep. The Sotto Voce was the most amazing piece of tech to come over the wall in...ever, but the design focused on functionality over her personal peeve with her partner. Of which, of course, Clint was well aware.

Consisting of a micrometer-thin patch of transparent circuitry adhered to the skin near the larynx and a device worn in the ear canal, or, in Clint's case, built into a standard hearing aid, the SV translated and encoded the wearer's sub vocalizations and transmitted them to the recipient's ear piece.

The most ingenious thing about it: apart from allowing them to chatter without risk of detection, the signal it broadcast was completely unintelligible to any other system. In addition to next-gen encryption, the SV didn't send sound waves or any sort of linear data at all. It sent the raw electrical signals generated by subtle, soundless motions of the wearer's tongue, throat and vocal cords. The data would be complete gibberish without a detailed map of the individual user's vocal anatomy.

It took some time to master, and it wasn't without its quirks, but it was an invaluable communication tool for the resistance. Instant short-range communication and completely secure long distance transmission; code-breakers hadn't been this foiled since the wind-talkers a hundred years ago. And the best part, no one seemed to be trying because no one had even noticed the signal.

"Damn. They _are_ here for Crispin X. Goddammit." she said as the tall detective yanked the VR glasses off the nearest cyber-punk wanna-be and demanded to know if he was the legendary hacker. She soundlessly drew both her Glocks and he repositioned and nocked an arrow in the small cross bow he used in short-ranged close quarters. The unique weapon and it's untraceable projectiles were silent and lethal in the hands of someone with Clint's skill, but, seriously, at what point did it become easier to just draw the gun in his tac-holster?

"They gotta find him first," he reminded her as they watched the two officers-in-rave-wear question the geek and bribe him with some tech-toy.  "Jesus, that accent...eighty percent hearing loss and _I_ can hear how fake it is."

"Enhanced, your hearing is better than mine."

"Chewing gum? Seriously? How is that a disguise?"  This was clearly a quickly-cobbled-together undercover operation; it was easy to sneer at the man and woman who were failing to pass as tech-elite. It was easy to forget how dangerous they were or the power they wielded beneath the faux-leather trench coat or purple bobbed wig. These people were out of their element, but for now, they were trying things the easy way. No doubt drones, city-wide scanners and a horde of MX foot soldiers stood at the ready in case they decided to try the hard way.

"You wouldn't believe the things I've done with chewing gum," she said tantalizingly.

"Try me. I've got quite an active imagination."

"Only if I can get you in some of that sexy guy-liner"

He couldn't tell if she was joking or not. Damn, this tech did have its limitations. Well, if she came at him with kohl anytime soon, he'd have his answer.

"You should get a wig like that. It's hot."

"What's with you and purple? But anything would be better than this ridiculous blond ponytail." Infiltrating the Delta Precinct had been easy; dressing up like a bashful, gawky network specialist was torture. She often said it was the worst cover ID she'd had since defecting.

"Goes well with the frills and sweater sets."

"Fuck off. Wait...is that... Shit. It is. It's Stahl and Kennex from Delta Precinct."

"We spent months setting up your cover there.  How the hell did you not know about this operation?"

"Barton, I've barely scratched the surface. An infiltration of this magnitude takes..."

"No names, remember?"

"If they can decode the SV feed, Clint, your name is probably the least of our worries."

"Like the fact that in the past two minutes you've given away your position, where you're embedded, details about your appearance. What the hell, Romanov? Gettin' way too confident in the SV. Or is all the blood rushing to your head?"

 "Tired, I guess." Probably a combination of all three of those things; Clint's words sounded teasing, but even with the flat affectation of the SV, his concern was clear. She didn't make mistakes. She was the Black Widow, dammit! She tried to turn it into a joke. "Some asshole kept me up most of the night."

He started to retort, but instead jumped back to the task at hand. "If these two are here, is there even a remote chance we're going to get what we came for?"

"Not if they find Crispin X. Damndamndamndamn." The SV interpreted her clenched teeth as a sharp feedback whine as the leather-clad officers approached their mutual target. "Keep your mouth shut, kid," she silently urged the oblivious hacker.

"Aphid? Did she just claim to be Aphid? As if."

"Hot chicks can't be hackers?"

"Hot chicks are rarely scrawny dudes in fedoras."

"You'll have to explain that one to me later. Since when do you know hackers?"

"I had a life before you, you know."

She muttered an indecipherable curse as the detective cuffed the kid; appropriating their first real lead in over a month. "Jack-booted fascist son of a..."

"From their perspective, _we_ are the terrorists."

"When we have even a quarter of their body count, you can call us terrorists."

"One man's freedom fighter is another man's terrorist.  Speaking of which...Want me to drop them now? I've got a clear line of sight. Or wait til they get outside?" The SV transmitted the sharp whine followed by the crackle of static that Natasha had come to recognize as Clint drawing back his bow.

"Neither. They'll have backup. Let's not turn this into anymore of a shit show. I wanna see how this plays. I'll redirect him in processing if it comes to it. He's too valuable to them to do any real harm, at least not right away. Besides, he doesn't know anything about us."

"Roger that."

 

* * *

 

 

Clint cracked his neck and rolled his shoulders uncomfortably as he drove a circuitous route at a discrete speed. Their cover identities were iron-clad and their real ones were expunged clear out of existence—that kind of certainty didn't come cheap. However, any sort of involvement with the authorities, robot or human, was best avoided, especially with Natasha's deep cover being in a precinct. He glanced over at her; artificially blond hair curtained her face as she looked out at the city.

"Were those the two that took out the Bishop?"

"He did. Near as I can tell, she's window dressing."

"Is he the one that no one likes, that got all those people killed, who bickers with your secret robot boyfriend?"

"Yeah. I swear, there is something going on there with those two..."

"In your dreams."

"Definitely. This assignment is boring as hell; I need some way to amuse myself."

"Trade ya. Wall duty is killing me."

"You are welcomed to fantasize about Mr. Leather making out with his bot, too."  She swiped a tired wrist across her eyes.

"I'll pass. How about you and her? Whatshername? Stalin?"

"Stahl. Another fucking perfect chrome. Fucking beautiful and fucking useless."

"The mouth on you tonight...."

"You didn't complain last night."

He wisely conceded the point in and moved on. "Anyway, Tasha, you're a chrome, too."

"I am a genetically-engineered, combat-specialized operative. Not some vanity project for super-rich parents."

He drove through the dark streets in silence. He was beginning to wonder if she'd dozed off when she shifted restlessly and proclaimed, "God, I still can't believe Kennex got away with taking out the Bishop. Shot the guy in cold blood."

"He did us a hell of favor. It would have been very bad if Barros had talked. Fucking slimeball. Although, I wish I could've taken him out myself." Clint had never been comfortable with their uneasy association with the crime syndicates. He had even less tolerance for the drug cartels. He volunteered whenever there was an opportunity to "take care" of a drug problem.  She suspected he occasionally freelanced.

"They won't process Nico—Crispin X, whatever he's calling himself—tonight. I'll get in early tomorrow, and I'll be able to handle it." She yawned sleepily. Showing this level of human frailty was rare for her. "Report first though."

"You need to sleep. I'll file the report when I go back over."

"File it from my place. Stay with me again tonight." Her light touch on his arm was the Natasha-equivalent of pleading.

"You know I can't, Tasha. We were taking a risk last night. I'd have to stay at least until nightfall tomorrow. I have to be back on the wall and you need to keep your cover."

"What? Mousy little Emma from IT can't have a bit of fun." She actually managed to sound petulant.

"When did I become the responsible one?"

"Since I've had less than six hours sleep in four days. Take me home. Stay. Don't stay. I'm too tired to fight you on it."

 "Ok," he agreed, unable to refuse another night in her arms and in her apartment with its luxuries of reliable lights, heat and virtually unlimited hot water in the shower. "Maybe we'll get another crack at the kid before I go back over the wall tomorrow night."

 

* * *

 

"Hey, babe?"

"Don't call me, babe. _Ever_." The last word lost some of its efficacy because she said it under a yawn.

She was fading fast. They had barely managed to secret their gear in the hidden panel in her closet before she shucked her suit, kicked it under the bed and collapsed onto the mattress. Her last notable indication of consciousness was when she wriggled back against him and rested her head on his bicep when he climbed in to join her. She pressed her back along his torso, settled her ass against his thighs and intwined her legs with his. His fingers curled against her hip and he was about to doze off himself when the thought occurred to him. "What kind of bot?"

"What? What bot?" she blinked the sleep back and turned to look at him quizzically.

"Detective Connect's bot. What kind? Can't be an MX if you are drooling over him."

"Oh, Kennex? His name's Dorian. A DRN.... Have you seen the specs on those things?"

"Yeah, it's his 'specs' you are interested in."

"And I don't drool."

"I think you might have been drooling on me just now. Put him in your next report. T may have worked out an exploit for the DRN processing core."

"If they haven't updated his encryption—and I bet they haven't—" she smiled sleepily, "that has....possibilities."


	2. Big Bother: by Readithoney

Detective John Kennex gripped at the steering wheel extra hard while he drove back to the precinct with Detective Valerie Stahl by his side and CrispinX, or Nico Galasso or whatever the hell his name was, sitting casually in the backseat; lounging, despite the fact that John put the cuffs on extra tight. It was fucking obnoxious.

He blinked against the heavy eye makeup he was wearing; it was making his eyes feel caked and sore, which he didn't know was a thing until now. He regretted letting Rudy Lom smear him with mascara and eyeliner and wrap him in leather clothing so he would fit in with the, as Rudy put it, "undulating bodies on the dance floor." The coat creaked when he moved and made him feel restricted and uncomfortable, the extra-large metallic belt buckle was digging into his stomach, and the fucking disguise hadn't even worked. Every quasi-conscious virtual reality geek they spoke to knew they were cops at first glance.

Valerie pulled off her purple wig and shifted her shoulders to look at the hacker in the back seat. Even with her hair stuck up against her head with bobby pins, she looked perfect. John could feel himself squirm in his ridiculous getup, the greasy makeup melting into his pores. He decided right then that Mr. Crisper the techno-twerp could spend the night in a holding cube. There was a long, hot shower in John's immediate future. And a beer. Three beers.

"Nico, what do you like about virtual reality?" Valerie asked conversationally, as if they were on their way to a fucking picnic, "To be honest, I was surprised that the 'party' we were crashing was…"

"An electric orgy?" the punk offered, a smarmy grin on his face. "Were you expecting a big, thrumming dance hall in the middle of this totalitarian city? We'd be swarmed with MXs before the first song could end."

John wondered if the eye makeup plastered on his face made it more or less apparent that he was rolling his eyes.

He cut into their mundane conversation, "You know why you  _really_ like VR?"

Stahl gave him a patient but cautious look and Nico leaned his shoulders back into the seat despite his cuffed wrists. "Enlighten me, Detective."

"You like that virtual crap because you feel like you're hiding from the world. You think you've found a place where we can't see you," Kennex relaxed a little, locking eyes with the long-haired miscreant via the rear-view mirror. "It's not about freedom, it's about hiding behind a moniker so you can commit crimes and make friends without having to leave your mom's basement."

The little shit in the back kept on smiling. "It's refreshing to enter a club where I can meet people without cameras reading my face, sending my location to a police databank, reading my alcohol content as I leave, and recording the sensitive details of my life in case, like what is happening literally  _right now_ , you need to drag my ass in and pin some crime on me."

"Don't commit crimes, you don't have to worry," John countered, decelerating off the express way.

"Define crime," Nico's smile melted off his face, "It seems kind of arbitrary in this city."

"Cyber-terrorism is pretty clearly defined," Stahl said, too reasonably for John's taste.

Nico was stony and quiet, exercising his right to remain silent.  _Finally,_ John thought.

* * *

He pulled into the station and parked. Valerie got out of the passenger's seat and smiled at John before heading inside. John smirked and watched her leave before opening the backdoor and hauling the 28-year-old hacker out of the car by the scruff of his hoodie. He made sure the kid's face was exposed to the cameras as he marched him inside the high-tech facility.

The hot-headed detective shoved Nico down into a chair in processing and picked up a tablet from a rack, poking in the details of the perp with one finger.

"Hope you don't fuck like you type," Nico said.

John bit his lip and looked around the station. It was late, but there were too many people milling around to give the kid a nice smack to the head with the heavy, portable device in his hands. Instead he said, "Maybe you'll find out tomorrow in interrogation." He walked around and cinched a chain on the chair to the cuffs on Nico's wrist.

With a clunk, he placed the tablet back on the rack and told one of the officers in processing to "Toss him in a holding cube," before stalking off to his desk.

As he walked through the precinct, he was met with quite a few snorting colleagues and remembered, when he passed a reflective pane of glass, that he was dressed like an asshole. He grimaced at his own reflection and felt downright foolish. Whatever he left on his desk, he could pick up tomorrow. He spun on his heels and booked it back to the cruiser.

Driving home, he reflected on a number of things. Firstly, he was going to find a way to hurt Rudy for convincing him to venture out in public dressed like a techno-punk sexbot. He also felt acutely aware of all the cameras that lined the streets, clubs, and corners. He was used to hearing terms like "totalitarian regime, "police state" and "Government of wolves," a bureaucracy, policeocracy, even a kakistocracy. He didn't give a shit what kind of "ocracy" they perpetuated; they were keeping the streets safe from the seemingly endless army of tech savvy criminals.

In his father's time, the police were lucky to have enough money to stay staffed. Once the government wised up and poured the military budget into the homeland law enforcement agency, things became more streamlined and safer. However, it took massive loss and panic to convince the powers that be to roll military and law enforcement into one and by that time, the crime had evolved beyond the threshold of control. If it had happened sooner, his dad might still be alive today. These underground society punks were just creating a distraction for the real, dangerous criminals, like Insyndicate.

He parked his cruiser and thumbed open the lock on his apartment door, pulled off the leather jacket and wadded it up, and stepped out of his boots. He undid the buckle to his belt and slipped it from the waist of his leather pants, tossing it to the floor with a clatter.  _What kind of sociopath would dress like this every goddamned day?_  In the bathroom he peeled himself out of his pants and stepped gratefully into the shower, rolling his shoulders under the hot stream.

He thought about Insyndicate as his fingers slipped soap over his synthetic leg. He'd lost his whole limb in a raid on the terrorist organization and spent seventeen months in a coma for his troubles. He tried not to obsess over finding the impossible-to-locate group, but his personal vendetta often forced its way into his mind when he had a moment to think.

After a nice long scrub, John stepped up to his sink to brush his teeth and nearly jumped out of his skin when he saw his own face in the mirror. His eyes were still rung with the oily black makeup only it was smeared across his temples and cheeks.  _Fuck._

* * *

Kennex waved his hand angrily in front of the holographic display on his alarm clock, desperately trying to snooze the nagging buzzer. His SmartBed informed him he had already snoozed five times and that was the maximum. Two really long work nights in a row were making him feel like an old man before his time as he smacked the clock silent and sat up in bed.

He balanced onto his foot and hopped over to the desk where he charged his leg and locked it into place at the end of his thigh. It powered on and replicated his skin tone as he flexed it and took the first few shaky steps before he fully calibrated.

Dorian was in the kitchen and coffee was already on by the time John was ready to go.

"Are you tired, John?" he asked, "I heard your SmartBed reprimand you for hitting snooze so many times."

"Beds don't reprimand their owners," John grouched, pouring himself a cup of strong, inky coffee. "It respects me. You could learn a thing or two from my SmartBed."

"I've learned enough from that thing, thank you," Dorian said, leaning against the door jamb in the kitchen.

John sighed at the sour look on his android partner's face, "Look, Dee," he conceded, his mouth half muffled by his coffee mug, "thanks for bringing me that cold-cream last night. I'd still look like a raccoon if you hadn't."

"Stahl is waiting for you so she can interrogate Nico Galasso," Dorian said, "Should I tell her we are leaving now, or do you want to snooze a few more times?"

John topped off his mug and gave Dorian a dangerous look, "Let's go," he said, pulling his jacket on, "I don't think Stahl is the right choice to interrogate that creep."

Dorian followed John out the door, "You only want him to yourself so you can intimidate him."

"Some people  _need_  a little intimidating."

* * *

_Goddammit_ , John wanted Stahl to leave the room.

She sat down when she spoke to suspects. She smiled. She spoke softly, though she didn't mince words. John preferred to lean his palms into the table and stand over the perps. Sometimes the truth needed to be sweated out of a person. Sometimes bled. With Stahl here, nothing was happening.

Nico had a self-righteous look on his face while they questioned him. It wasn't until John leaned in on him and let him know that he was already facing guaranteed time in the cubes for cyber-terrorism that he began to look a little stressed.  _Good._

Stahl informed him, coolly, that he could also look forward to murder charges for the smart-house hacking that they were investigating. They found Nico when he hacked the city's power grid under his hacker-handle, CrispinX.

The murder charge sent the tech-whiz into a fit.

Dorian motioned John to exit the glass interrogation room and informed him of another murder via SmartHouse override.

It wasn't Nico, he'd spent the night in a station holding cube. It was a sure thing, too, John could smell the stagnant air on the kid's clothes.

In light of the news, John pushed the door back open and offered Galasso a chance to help them find the hacker who was causing the real damage. In exchange, he'd drop the cyber-terrorism charges. It was a fantastic deal and Nico knew it. He accepted right away.  _Smart._

The new murder needed their attention so Nico went back in the holding cube, waiting for transport. He'd be Stahl's problem for the rest of the day. John and Dorian were going over the details and getting ready to head out to the scene.

Dorian was chattering about Detective Paul's absence when John spotted the little blond woman from IT sauntering by the cubicles. He placed his fingers over the DRN's lips to shut him up and took a few long strides to catch up with the woman.

"Hey, Emily," he called.

She stopped and turned to greet him, a shy smile on her face. Her straight blond hair was pulled back into a smart pony tail and she wore wire rim glasses that made her look intelligent. She honestly wasn't John's type, but had a tight body under that suit and right now she was carrying a box of what appeared to be donuts.

"Emma," she corrected.

"Nice box," John said, wincing as the words left his mouth. "I mean, what's in the box?  _That_  box." He pointed to the cardboard pastry container in her hands.

"You want one?" she opened the lid to reveal rows of donuts, as he suspected. John took two.

"Thanks," he said, balancing the sticky breakfast pastries on his palm, "Hey, what brings you over this way?"

She shifted on her feet, nervously looking around as if she wasn't comfortable with the detective's fumbling conversation, "Heard you guys had a…a hacker. Thought I'd make sure the network was secure in this sector."

"Oh yeah?" John said, nodding and pushing his lips out as if he was impressed. He rested his shoulder on the wall and smirked, "do you hack, Emma?" he asked it scoldingly.

She blushed, "No," she said, "I have to go," and spun off down the hall.

"I was only kidding," John called after her, taking an awkward step and dropping a donut. It rolled across the floor. Stooping, he picked it up, blew on it and shrugged.

When he walked back to the desk, donut powder on his lips, Dorian shook his head slowly.

"What?" John asked.

"You are terrible with women, John. Why do you keep trying?"

John raised his donut and took another big bite.

Dorian looked fully annoyed and took the dirty floor-donut from John and dropped it in the trash. He watched him finish the other one. Dorian wasn't sure how John managed to eat the way he did and still look so trim and fit. He'd been the man's partner for over a year and had yet to see him eat him a vegetable that wasn't hidden or smothered in something else.

They walked to the cruiser together, John slapping powdered sugar off the front of his black shirt and sucking his fingers.

They got in the car and Dorian reached over and smeared a bit of sugar off the detective's shirt-collar, "You're a mess."

John shrugged unapologetically and rolled them out to go visit the next victim in their hacking case.


	3. Coffee and Donuts by DJLiopleurodon

Natasha hated taking the extra time every morning to straighten her hair before sweeping it back in the too-tight, too-low ponytail. Quite a contrast from the too-tight, too-low jeans that usually accompanied her undercover gigs. She’d had assignments that were far more difficult within the city walls, but, by the end of the day, Emma gave her a headache. While she disliked the persona, it was a nice change to find herself in a place where the eyes of everyone she passed didn’t assess her as an object of desire, fear, envy or conquest.  

But then, for every human eye, there were at least two dead robotic eyes and a score of unseen lenses. It annoyed her that the people of this precinct seemed like good people; she didn’t understand how they could go about their real lives under the government’s constant scrutiny.

No way she could submit to living her whole life like that, even if it meant waking up in bed next to Clint every morning. Though that did have its appeal.  

"Mmrph," he said, when she flicked on the light and tried to wake him. She pulled off his covers, smacked his bare ass and figured he'd amble into the shower soon enough.

It didn't take long for him to blearily open the glass door, jostle her aside, and turn his face up to the hot spray.

She neglected to get dressed before she began her morning ritual of frying her curls into submission with the flat iron while he tried to make up his mind if he was going to watch her from the small kitchen with the coffee maker or from the comfort of the bed.

"Go back to bed," she urged as he invaded her space to toss his towel over the shower door to dry. "Sleep in since you can." Even though she was proud to be a citizen beyond the wall, she was well aware of the privations of their lives there. Like her, Clint could sleep anywhere, eat anything, endure most any conditions and just about survive anything. But that didn't mean either of them were immune to the amenities and luxuries that the walled city provided, especially when they weren’t purchasing these fleeting comforts at the expense of their civil liberties.

“Good idea.” He glanced slyly at the bed and then back at her.

He kissed her neck and pulled her back against him, meeting her eyes in the mirror. She glanced regretfully at the clock but allowed herself to relax back against his warm skin and skim her nails through his hair as she anchored his mouth against the curve of her neck.

When she left the bed for the second time that morning, he stayed in the disarray of sheets.

"There's cereal in the cupboard," she said, securing the elastic tightly in her hair before buttoning an awful polyester blouse.

"Coffee?"

"Hmm. Probably."

"Probably? Fuck, Nat," he complained sleepily, managing to read her lips with his face half-buried in the pillows.

"Go back to sleep, Hawkeye. I'll update you as soon as I figure out what is up with Galasso and you can file the report."

"Do you have any extra Voce patches?"

"Yeah, I calibrated a few for you already. I'll keep my receiver on, but I'm not going to put on my other hardware unless I need to." She dropped the patches on the night stand along with the ear pieces. He fumbled for them and stuffed one in for the sake of vigilance.

"What are you going to do after you report in?"

"T gave me a list of things to bring back. He knew I'd stay."

"He give you the coin for it?" Their technical guru’s formerly wealthy life sometimes meant he forgot things cost money in the real world.

"Did me one better," Clint said, reaching over the side of the bed and pulling his heavily augmented phone from the heap of clothing on the floor. He tossed it to her. "Gave me a bit-cloner."

She inspected the sleek and artfully-battered device. It exactly resembled a mid-range Lumia, last year’s model, one of the ones with a bit-coin key and built-in biometrics. The digital currency system was rife with opportunities for exploitation, but these all-in-one units were practically an invitation. A clever technologist could build a bit-cloner inside a phone in a weekend. This particular one was a work of art.

“Nice. Grab any good creds?”

He smirked but didn’t answer.

 

* * *

 

“How come you never bring me donuts, _Emily_ ”?

Natasha was actually startled when Clint’s voice thrummed in her ear; the inflection completely natural since he could speak aloud in the relative safety of her apartment. She’d become so used to the feeling of the device and so used to being on her own here that she’d forgotten he was with her. She ducked into the ladies’ room to slip on her patch and transmitter.

“Have you been listening in most of the day?”

“Well… yeah.”

“That’s not creepy, or anything.”

“What else is there for me to do? I didn’t bring anything with me. Your media library sucks. Watching the news here makes me want to shoot the screen. The other day-time shows make me want to shoot myself. You hardly have any books and nothing I’d want to read.  You only have granola and almond milk in the kitchen. And I can eavesdrop and clean my weapons. And yours.”

“You touched my Glocks?” Quiet murder in her voice even over the SV.

“No, no,” he reassured, “I have my limits on death-defying feats. I just honed your blades a little. Chill.”

A faint feedback whine.

“So, uh…. was that Connects?”

“Ugh. Yes.” She hoped he heard the derision she was emphasizing for his benefit. Honestly after all she’s put up with over the years, John Kennex’s flat-footed little attempt at flirting had been almost cute. And she liked that he didn’t seem to mind the cliche of unabashedly scarfing down the donuts. The other officers, especially the guys over 30, all seemed a bit ashamed of taking the pastries.

There was no point in opening herself up to more mockery with respect to the rugged detective and his android partner. For all the teasing about the unique DRN with the incongruous, beautiful blue eyes and polite manners, there was something appealing about this man, too.

At least, until he opened his mouth.

“How could you tell?”

“Just figured you’d be hanging around the interrogation room. They got him in there?”

“Yeah. Looks like they just finished up. Glass looked transparent the whole time. Seemed like they were leaning on him a bit, and the kid looked pretty freaked out at one point. But he’s back to looking like a smug little bastard again. So maybe we can get him tonight after all.”

“Looks like I’m in town for another day,” a self-satisfied smile in his voice. She _knew_ he’d been bullshitting last night about not planning to stay.  “I’m going out for coffee. On Connects.”

“You bit-cloned him? That’s stupid, Clint. Don’t do that. Don’t underestimate them. They are _dangerous_. I have about 25 sets of credentials you can use. I even have one for your current cover.”  

“It’s not my fault that he carried _his own creds_ into their little op last night. I’m not getting anything big; just some stuff that’s so trivial that its not worth it to go through our regular channels. It won’t trigger an alert until way after I’m gone.”

“They will be getting wise to it soon. That type of bit-cloner was part of what we auctioned off a few months ago to refill the coffers. I heard the buyer resold it to Insyndicate. Captain was _pissed_.”

In his silence, she heard ‘ _I’m going to do it anyway_.’ Clint was a big boy; he could take care of himself. At worst, he would burn his current identity when the cameras caught him. This long in the city, it was probably time for him to do so anyway.

“You are getting Tony booze, aren’t you?”

“Um, maybe. And coffee. And some actual food.”

 

* * *

 

Clint had filed his report, taken the longest shower of his life and even made the bed and washed his clothes.  He was sitting around, trying not to get gun oil on her pink bathrobe (which he sincerely hoped was something she picked up when she was creating her “Emma from IT” identity and not something more worrisome; namely that she had _wanted_ a fluffy pink bathrobe) when he contacted her via the SV.

He considered her caution and decided to use a different bit-clone at each of the different retailers he was going to patronize.

But Connects was _still_ going to buy him coffee.

And a donut.

Or two.

 

Dressed in civies, a baseball cap and not-too-dark glasses, he felt pretty inconspicuous, but not conspicuously inconspicuous. His first stop was at the biggest, busiest of the premium coffee shops. He had decided to only use his stolen bits at the big corporations. He knew that was a massive rationalization and recognized the hypocrisy of being charged with keeping the peace in the sector nearest the wall and then coming over to this side and behaving like a common criminal. However, after listening to Connects ineptly hitting on Tasha, he was really looking forward to this coffee.

He thumbed the key and scrolled through his various identities until he found John Kennex. When he waved his phone over the reader, it transmitted the bits and Kennex’s biometrics. Capitalism inched forward and no one had to touch anything as crude as money.

He liberally applied sugar and cream to the steaming cup, marveling at the seemingly endless supply of both commodities.

Goddamn, he missed having regular access to good coffee and real cow’s milk.

He knew better than to linger around a “crime scene” so he travelled several blocks and set about collecting the items on Tony’s list. Finally, he stopped at a small grocery store and used the credentials of a chrome stock-broker to buy steaks, some vegetables and potatoes. His cooking skills were limited, but this was the meal being prepared on the one morning cooking show he’d tried to watch before giving up on TV. It didn’t look that hard and it would give him something to do this afternoon.

“David Archer?”

The stiff MX approached from the right. Clint glanced down the alley to his left and calculated how many steps it would take to reach that fire escape. From there, he could draw his bow and take on as many MXs and drones as they threw at him. Ten blocks to the nearest passage back beyond the wall.

He could easily evade one MX and could probably take out two before he needed his weapons.  A few more MXs approached, all with guns drawn. All repeating the same phrase at slightly different times. His quiver was full of bolts made from a compound specifically designed to combat MXs. The material had proven too volatile for bullets, but a small amount of it on an  arrow head had a devastating effect on the automatons. He was dying to try it in the field.  

However, when he saw the fifth MX and the two armed drones, he decided that losing his ‘David Archer’ identity, his bit-cloner and his arsenal was preferable to the city-wide alert that would ensue by the time he made it back to the wall. No amount to video scrubbing would allow him to be able to enter the city ever again. Like Tony, he’d be permanently regulated to the other side.

Fine. Surrender it was, then. It was a bitter pill to swallow. Especially when he’d been aching for an opportunity to do some actual damage. And he had really wanted to take on a bunch of MXs and show those smug bastards how misplaced their faith in those damn things were. He could show them what real human ingenuity could do.

He was confident in his cover and knew that the SV looked so much like a standard hearing aid, they wouldn’t even give it a second glance once they saw partial deafness on David Archer’s record. Tasha would be able to get him released and would have yet another thing to remind him of next time she was telling him not to be an idiot.

Great. He needed more of those.

He dropped the shopping bags and raised his hands.

“Hey, guys,” he said to the MXs.


	4. Cupid's Chokehold by Readithoney

John chewed his lip. It was supposed to be his day off but a recent purchase on his bit-bait account had potential. Reports that Insyndicate had purchased bit-cloner tech had been the first trace of the group’s activity in ages. While anonymous tips were often dead-ends, Kennex had insisted that Rudy create phony bitsticks for the Delta detectives to carry. Richard Paul and Valerie Stahl had gone along with it for months before quietly shuttering the devices in desk drawers and forgetting about them. John hadn’t given up though, and it was all paying off today. 

He itched with anticipation. He’d had Dorian put his name on the case right away. There was no argument from the other detectives, who didn’t want to draw attention to the fact that they’d ditched the bit-bait months ago. Dorian was a little roughed up from last night’s heroics in the SmartHouse murder case but followed John through the corridors nonetheless.

Nostrils flaring, teeth on edge, breathing like a dragon: John was in overdrive. Dorian wasn’t going to take his eyes off the detective for a moment.

The android had called ahead and had the perp, David Archer, placed in an interrogation room. John stopped outside the glass room, his hands flexing uncontrollably. He was mad and excited; if this man was Insyndicate, he might be the key to finding Anna Moore, the woman who took his heart and left him humiliated, missing a leg, and the sole survivor of his fourteen-man raid team. He had questions, and if Archer had answers, John was going to rip them out of him by any means necessary.

The guy didn’t look like a petty bit-thief; he was too old, buff, and clean looking. John poured himself a cup of coffee from the well-grimed pot and took a way-too-hot sip. “Let’s do this; black it out.”

Dorian followed him into the sound-proof glass chamber and immediately frosted the glass to full opacity.

The man cuffed to the chair looked John and Dorian up and down as they entered, his blue eyes sizing up the detective and his android. His lip curved into the slightest hint of a grin.

John sat his coffee on the table and took his coat off, his back to the suspect. He handed his coat to Dorian and walked to the evidence box on the far side of the room. Peering inside, he turned to look at the other two men with a quirked eyebrow. “Dorian,” he said with a hitch of a chuckle in his voice, “check this shit out.”

Dorian watched curiously as John lifted a small crossbow out of the box and a compound bow, holding them up with a grin.

“That is…unexpected,” Dorian remarked. “Curious that his name is _Archer_.”

“Might be an alias.” John held the crossbow up and looked down the shaft with one eye closed, pointing it at the suspect’s chest. “Turns out he’s fucking Robin Hood.”

“What else is in the box?” Dorian asked.

John turned to dig through, slamming the crossbow down roughly on the table. He let the slick, collapsible compound bow clatter to the floor. The man in cuffs seemed unperturbed. “Gosh, I hope there’s a sling shot in here, too. Maybe a sword?” He dug around and pulled out a mod cell phone, tossing it to Dorian who caught it, his fingers flickering blue around the device. 

“What do they call this thing, Dee?” John asked, holding up a bundle of arrows and bolts.

“Quiver,” Dorian said, his blue lights tracing the circuitry on his face for the briefest moment.

“You didn’t know that?” Archer asked, incredulous and amused. _Stupid._

John walked up and placed the toe of his boot on the chair seat, between the man’s parted thighs. He leaned in. “Yeah Cupid, I didn’t know. I was born in this century.” He leaned in more, pressing his knee into the other man’s chest, hard. He dropped his voice low and dangerous. “Hunting squirrels?”

When Archer didn’t answer, John balled a fist. Dorian stepped in tactfully. “John, let me get a full scan.” He walked around and stood to John’s right. “Before you change his face.” 

John nodded and pushed his foot back a little into the man’s genitals and shoved the chair a few inches across the floor as he drew his leg back to the ground. “Good point.”

“Curious,” Dorian said, his face moving with light. “I’m getting another read on the rec scan, but from my offline files, before I was decommissioned. My stored records have him listed under a different identity. Someone must have deliberately removed this information from our police databanks, replacing his identity with that of David Archer.”

_Insyndicate._ John was convinced now.  

“A _thief_ who shoots arrows and chooses the name _Archer_?” John asked. He locked his eyes on the compromised man. “Adorable. What’s his real name, Dee?” 

“Clint Barton,” Dorian said. “I don’t have a full file on him. As if part of it is missing.” 

“Clint?” John asked the cuffed man.

Clint cocked his head and sucked his teeth. He didn’t seem all that frightened. In fact, he seemed rather amused.

Dorian looked warily at both men. If this is how it was going to be, John seething, Clint entertained, things would get messy fast.

 " Are we funny?” John asked. “Is this fun?”

Barton smirked. Dorian stepped away, his lips pressed into a frown and his blue orbs glancing to the ceiling and back as John laid a fist across the man’s jaw. When he looked back, Clint’s head was turned to the side and his busted lip seeped a few blood drops onto his shirt front.

“Still funny?” John asked, anger crushing out.

Clint turned his head back, blood on his bottom teeth. He spit a bit of blood to the floor and shrugged his shoulders up. “Yeah, a little.” 

“Where is Insyndicate?” John asked. Dorian was reading vitals on both men, keeping it safe. Safe-ish.

“Fuck if I know,” Clint spat, looking up, his eyes meeting John’s steadily. Despite his open lip, the guy wasn’t even sweating. John could usually lower his voice and lean on a perp a little and the whole room would get humid.

“We already know you work for them, Barton,” John’s lips curled around his teeth somewhere between a grin and a grimace. “You can tell me or I can beat it out of you.”

Clint stared hard. “You can’t beat information out of me that I don’t have.”

John turned around, feigning resignation, and then powered around to deliver a punch to the man’s gut. He was absolutely surprised by the wall of rock that met his fist. Clint had abs like a statue. He doubled a little, but it didn’t make him spasm or groan. It was like he had known it was coming and steeled himself. John stood up, hiding his distress and trying not to shake out his hand in pain.  

Angered by the level of control his suspect maintained, he hooked the toe of his boot under the front of the chair and pulled up, letting Barton fall hard onto his back, still in the chair. His arms crushed beneath the chair back and his head bounced off the rubberized floor.

The back of the chair crunched Clint’s cuffed hands into the floor, the metal rings biting into his wrists. That elicited a much more satisfying response.  

Dorian stooped forward and tilted the chair back up onto its legs. He looked at John. _Round two_.

“Someone took the time to sponge your identity,” John said, picking a clunky tablet up off the table, a hard protective case with handles surrounding it.“I can’t imagine it was you. Running around with a bow and arrows, you don’t strike me as the tech savvy type.” He leaned in close to the suspect to look into his face.

“I wouldn’t be too sure, John,” Dorian said, holding up the cell phone. “This is a pretty impressive piece of tech.” 

John poked at the tablet with his finger. “Let’s see here,” he said. “You cloned my bit-drive and bought . . . ” John slid his finger through the report pages, stabbing at the screen. “ . . . a large coffee and two donuts.” John sneered happily. “Was it worth it?” 

“They were good donuts,” Clint assured John. 

John continued to futz with the tablet. 

“Jesus,” Clint said, looking at Dorian with raised eyebrows, “does he fuck like he types?”

John looked up at Dorian. “What the hell does that even mean?” It was the second time he’d heard that this week. 

Dorian smiled toward the ground. 

John went back to his tablet a moment then cast his eyes back to Clint. “Insyndicate has done an awful lot of damage in the city. You don’t want to take _all_ the blame, do you?”  

Clint looked unmoved. 

John took a draw from his coffee mug then set it back down. He leaned in, lowering and slowing his voice. “You’re already looking at a minimum of two in the cubes for your little toy weapons. Guaranteed.” He looked at Dorian for a moment to confirm. Dorian checked the procedure and gave a curt nod. They didn’t run into arrows very often, or, ever. If it had been a firearm, the penalty would be worse. 

John watched in disbelief as the man he just threatened rolled his head back and yawned loudly. 

The furious detective hefted the tablet in his hands and then hauled back, cracking it across Barton’s face.

“John,” Dorian said calmly. 

Blood dripped from Clint’s nostrils and from a small cut on his forehead where the tablet made first contact. He looked a little dazed for a moment.

“Insyndicate,” John growled, waiting for information.

He was tense and angry now. Dorian recognized his partner’s elevated heart rate and stepped in to take over. 

The android placed a hand on Clint’s shoulder, up by his neck, and squeezed gently. 

Dorian felt the muscles pulling in Clint’s neck and examined him curiously. While he looked at John ominously and drooled blood, his tongue was moving in his mouth. Dorian cocked his head, his blue eyes scanning. The cuffed man swallowed hard and stopped his strange activity. 

“I’m not Insyndicate,” Clint rasped, ”I’m not. Really, I’m not with those assholes.” 

John was seething in the background. 

“But you do know who they are,” Dorian stated. 

“F’heard of them,” Clint said breathily. Dorian figured the guy didn’t want any more abuse and that was fine because the DRN was cutting John off.As it was, Barton was going to need some medical attention in the holding cell and John might get some heat for his methods. 

“Do you know where they are based?” Dorian asked, his voice calm and even controlled over the sound of John’s breathing. 

Dorian stepped on something as he turned to look at John, crunching it under his boot. He picked it up and examined the tiny device. 

“What is it?” John shouldered up to Dorian to take a look. 

“A listening device worn in the ear,” Dorian said. “Like a hearing aid. Only this one does more; it’s been modified.” 

John took it and held it to his own ear, listening carefully, a look of concentration on his fraught countenance. 

“I stepped on it,” Dorian said flatly, taking it back. “It’s broken. Sorry.” 

“Is he deaf or something?” John asked, jabbing his thumb in Clint’s direction. He turned to Clint who shied away. “Are you deaf?” he asked. 

“John,” Dorian pressed. He almost sounded embarrassed. 

“If he was, he’d get an implant, right?” John asked his partner. 

“They aren’t cheap.” Dorian shrugged. “I think this is more though. More than it seems.” He slipped the broken piece of plastic into his pocket with Clint’s mod phone. These were questions for Rudy. 

Clint’s bloody face squinted up at them, his head cocking to the side a little. “Not everyone wants to be a cyborg, right, Connects?”  

John felt hyper-aware of his leg and took a step forward but Dorian put a hand on his chest discretely, staying him. 

“Cyborgs,” John grunted. Barton blinked at him, smirking. 

John reached down and gathered a fistful of the front of Clint’s shirt, yanking him up so the back legs of the chair lifted off the ground slightly. Clint winced as his raw wrists ground against his bonds. Dorian watched him warily. “Listen,” he said through clenched teeth--

The door to the interrogation room opened up and the woman from IT with the straight blond pony tail backed in, pulling a metal cart with tools and a clunky ladder on it. 

John released Clint’s shirt, letting him slump back, the chair rocking back until all four feet rested. “Emily?” he said, trying not to sound too annoyed.

“Emma,” the woman corrected, again, turning to look at him. She saw the bloody man in the chair and jumped back in shock, covering her mouth with both hands. 

“Relax,” John said, “he’s fine.” 

Emma looked distraught. “Are you okay, sir?” she asked Clint, taking a few steps forward. 

“We’re going to have to ask you to leave,” Dorian said, blocking her path. 

“This room’s camera is down and the entire sound system is offline,” Emma said, her voice shaky. “It isn’t suitable for….interrogation.” It was clear she thought there was something more sinister going on. And she was right. 

She puffed her chest out and pushed her glasses back up her nose.

John could tell she was upset and thought she was saving someone from police brutality. He also figured he wasn’tgoing to get anywhere flirting with this woman in the office. He probably wasn’t going to get any more donuts from her, either. “Calm down,” John said, holding both hands up, palms out, to make her feel safe. “We’re done for today.” 

He was pretty sure Barton could barely hear them anyhow. 

The young woman crossed her arms across her chest protectively and waited while Dorian released the perp from the chair, cuffed him again behind his back, and walked him from the room. 

John grabbed his coffee off the table. It was cold now but he took a sip. “Don’t be scared of the people we have in the station, Em...ma” he reassured. “We’ll keep you safe from guys like him.” 

She looked at him wide eyed with disbelief. 

He took another sip; smiled lopsidedly. Then pursed his lips awkwardly. “Okay, well, good luck.” He shot out the door. 

* * *

Dorian placed Barton’s cell phone and the broken hearing device on the metal table in front of Dr. Rudy Lom. The lean technician wore many hats in his role at the precinct and John had a tendency to regard the socially awkward genius as his own personal thrall, calling on him for nearly every case with a vast variety of challenges, questions, and tasks. Rudy took it all in stride. 

“This cell phone is brilliant,” Rudy said, picking up the device and turning it in his hands. “The upgrades I can see are impressive and made with scrap materials. And the encryption is amazing. I’m not sure I can unlock it.” He pressed at the screen cautiously, making small, awed noises.

John looked unamused. “Well, if you can’t unlock it, I can get him to tell us how tomorrow.” 

Rudy looked up at Dorian, who gave him a miserable look back, indicating that John was a little on edge about this case. 

“I’ll work on it,” Rudy promised. He placed the phone down and scooped up the hearing aid, holding it up close to his eyeline. “Now this, this is not scrap.” 

“Out of date, isn’t it?” John asked, fidgeting a little, thinking about his leg. 

“Not actually,” Rudy said. “Sleek and small, but powerful. It looks like a receiver but for what, I don’t know. I’d say we’re looking at new underground tech. Again.” Rudy flashed his eyes at the men in his presence. “Why’s it broken?” 

John punched Dorian in the arm lightly. “Dee stepped on it.” 

“I did,” Dorian said, turning to look at John then back to Rudy, “after John knocked it out of the man’s head with a tablet.” 

John shot daggers at Dorian with his eyes and a heavy brow. “Yeah well, see what you can find, Rudy,” he ordered. “I’d like to get him back in the chair soon with some hard evidence.” 

“I’ll see what I can do,” Rudy promised. “Oh, and Dorian, if you’re staying here tonight, I’ve thought of a new strategy in holochess to try.” Rudy grinned at the android with excitement. 

John clapped Rudy on the arm a little too hard. “You don’t have time for that; crack that phone and put that ear thing back together.” 

Rudy wanted to tell John that he’d logged a ridiculous amount of overtime for him already, which was a big deal because he was salaried. He also thought about telling him to add ‘please’ and ‘thank you’ to his vocabulary. Of course, he didn’t. 

Dorian stayed behind as John made his way up the stairs to the exit. “I’d love to see your new holochess strategy though I doubt you will beat me,” he smiled. “Thank you for looking into this tech for us, Rudy.” 

Rudy felt better and even forgave John his rudeness as Dorian took the steps two at a time to catch up with his surly counterpart. 

* * *

 John had one arm curled around a bowl of extra spicy Thai curry chicken and the other hand cradled a beer. The booth they were tucked into was frayed and sorely in need of new upholstery, or at the very least, a good scrub. “Why do we always have to go to the ‘skirts for you to get food?” Dorian complained. 

“If you could eat,” John said, “you’d know.” 

Dorian looked at the bowl of chicken, vegetables, and rice floating in coconut milk and spice. It looked unremarkable, and too spicy, but at least John was getting some vegetables and taking some of his pent-up aggression out on his taste buds instead of Clint Barton. 

John asked the waitress for another beer as she walked past and then looked at Dorian while stabbing a saturated bamboo shoot onto his fork. “Quiet mode,” John accused. “What has you upset?” 

Dorian let his eyes scope the room before settling them back on John. “You were a little rough today.”

“Please,” John snapped. “We’re dealing with dangerous, high-tech, underhanded terrorists. And besides, I only hit him a little. All the blood just makes it look worse than it is.” 

“A trash-built cell phone, manual hearing aid, and a bow and arrow don’t seem that high tech to me,” Dorian said.  

The waitress brought John his beer and he thanked her. The tinny music playing by the bar didn’t help dissipate the mood as John took a swig.  

“I don’t know,” John finally conceded. He looked off to the side, biting back his doubt and anger. 

“I understand.” Dorian put his hand on the table between them. “It’s upsetting. And Anna tricked you into giving Insyndicate information. You don’t have to carry that burden.” 

“Let’s not do this,” John said, waving his hand as if dissolving the conversation in the air. 

A long silence stretched between them as John finished his curry. When he was scraping the bottom of the bowl, Dorian spoke up. “You’re not a cyborg, John.” 

John did his best to look at his empty bowl, wishing he had more food to occupy him, keep him from having to look up. No such luck. He glanced at Dorian, piercing blue eyes and compassionate eyebrows. “I know that, Dee. Fuck.” He slid his bowl away and tapped his bits to the electronic reader on the table. “Let’s get out of here.”

 


	5. Go Ahead, Make My Day by DJLiopleurodon

“You get Nico, Tasha. I’ll be fine. I can spend a night in a cell. I’m just a petty bit-thief.”

She knew he was right. For all his bravado and irreverence, Clint was extremely competant. He knew how important this mission was to them all.

That obnoxious geek had tapped into the city’s power grid; and more importantly, he had accessed the lines that ran near the wall. The grid had once covered the whole city and it had been capped when the wall went up. If they could route power out of the city…

But it had to be done quickly - before the authorities figured out how to close the holes “CrispinX” had opened.

“You are an idiot, Barton.”

“I know. Do you ever get tired of being right?”

“Not really, no. How did they get you?”

“Not sure. One of the bit clones must have been monitored. I used a couple different ones. I don’t know which ones got me. Got pinched by a couple of MXs and spent the rest of the day riding around in the police transport until they dropped us all of at booking.”

“Ok. I’m on my way to make contact with Galasso. You wouldn’t have been much help in persuading him anyway. With any luck, we’ll have the power diverted by the end of the week.”

“Just get me the hell out of here tomorrow, okay? These fucking MXs are creeping me out.”

* * *

She swore under her breath when she checked on him the second she got in. Clint had already been taken from general lock-up to the custody of an officer from cyber-crimes earlier that morning. While he could handle a few hours in a room with one of those guys without blinking, it meant she couldn’t get him out until they were finished with him. Once cyber got bored and tossed him back into general, she could spring him pretty quickly. She kept her SV line open and listened to the muffled sound of the cyber crimes detective’s questions and Clint’s silence, punctuated by his well-timed, but probably genuine yawns.

Clint just couldn’t help himself. How someone with his practically pathological need to challenge and provoke authority had managed in the military, she had never figured out.

She disabled recording in the interrogation room; she wanted as little evidence that he’d ever been there, but it meant that she couldn’t watch the feed herself. She monitored him all morning via the SV and followed his status in the system. Finally, David Archer popped back up in the queue.

He was being transferred again - to the custody of the department’s resident Insyndicate expert.

Shit.

  


She followed him on the monitors as the MX walked him to an interrogation room near Kennex’s desk and felt a stab of unease when she went to turn off the audio and video as she had done for cyber and found that it was already off and the lockout was engaged.  She found a video feed that looked out over the whole squad room and into the glass cubicle.

“A/V in the room is off,” she warned Clint.

“You turned it off in cyber, too, right?”

“I did. But I didn’t disable it here because someone already had; something’s up.”

“They are sticking me with your boyfriends,” he informed her as the two men approached the interrogation room.

“Kennex has a real-hard on for Insyndicate.”

“Is that what this is about? Kinda makes you wish you’d let me pick him off the other night, huh?”

“Just take it easy.”

“It’s what I do best.”

“And, Barton, don’t piss him off too much,” she said as the glass fogged him from view.

“Sure thing, babe.”

This was going to be bad.

* * *

Natasha had to swipe her hand over mouth to hide her smile as the detectives ridiculed Clint’s weapons. If they only knew…

They continued their show of detached intimidation; alternately talking about “David Archer” as if he wasn’t in the room, addressing him with disdain and emphasizing his  subordination as they stood looking down at him.

He kept up a silent commentary of snarky retorts to the officers needling and apprising her of the activity in the room.

Clint grunted over the comm channel. “He’s got his knee on my chest and his foot a few inches from my junk.”

It was Big-Scary-Detective 101; right down to the opaque glass and the threatening physical contact.

She wondered if it even occurred to either of the two interrogators that they might be locked in a room with someone that could do some serious damage even while cuffed to a chair. The fact that one of them could bench a small car or that they were in the middle of an absurdly fortified police station undercut that a bit but the fact remained that these two had absolutely no idea who they were dealing with.

While not the expert that she was, Clint had experience in both sides of interrogation. Although, he was relegated to the “good cop” mostly, something that tended to unbalance most people when the two of them walked into the room.

Still, she would have preferred he talk less. From the detective’s reactions, she could tell Clint was exuding smug provocation.

It all changed in a second. She felt like she’d been punched when she heard the DRN’s quiet voice say Clint’s name. She heard tension jolt through Clint, but imagined him still defiant, confident that she could easily get him out at any time. She didn’t completely share his conviction. If Dorian tried to access that file in the main database, an alert would go out to Homeland. Once that happened, she had two, maybe three hours to get Clint out and back over the wall.

She wasn’t surprised when she heard the loud but dull thud of a fist making contact with Clint’s jaw. In fact she could probably imagine the expression on his face the moment before John hit him. She usually fantasized about smacking him herself when he smirked at her like that.

Clint continued to provoke the aggressive detective, practically daring him to continue pounding on him.

Another burst of feedback and a huff; a body blow of some kind. Even though the noise translated dramatically over the SV, she suspected Clint hadn’t reacted much to what the detective had expected to elicit a dramatic response.

She puffed out a breath she didn’t realize she’d been holding when Clint’s head bounced off the floor and his gasp of pain crackled under the feedback static.

But, even that didn’t seem to phase him for long.

_Does he fuck like he types?_

She couldn’t let him go on like this. Engaging her transmitter, she put as much cold threat into her words as she could. “That’s enough, Barton. _Shut up_!”

She wasn’t sure if the dismissive sound she heard was aimed at the detective Clint was antagonizing or in response to her. “I’ve had worse,” he told her.

“Yeah? And what about when he hurts you enough that they transfer you to medical? Once you are there, I won’t be able to get you out for at least six hours.” He kept trying to interrupt her but she kept talking over him. Using the SV undetected when someone was looking directly at you was hard. She could manage it. Clint struggled.

“And,” she continued, “by then, the feds might be here. They have _your name_. These guys, these cops, still have rules they follow. Their captain won’t tolerate this forever. You know what happens when the feds get you, right?  You’re gone. They won’t even have to scrub you out of the system; we did that for them. Right now, all Kennex cares about is finding Insyndicate. Stop antagonizing him and fucking tell him you aren’t with them before he stops asking about them and decides to start asking the _right_ questions.”

“The more I piss him off, the quicker its going to be over. Trust me, Tasha, I know what I’m doing.”

She knew what he was doing, too: setting himself up to be the latest one to be disappeared by the authorities. They’d been trying for years to find Bobbi Morse and Danny Rand, but she doubted they ever would. If Barton got out of this alive, she was going to kill him.

When Kennex resumed his threats of time in the cubes, Clint yawned.

“Goddammit, Clint! Stop….” Her words were cut off by a sickening crunch combined with a sharp electronic squeal.

The sounds suddenly got tinny and indistinct. She heard Clint groan in genuine pain and distant heavy breathing. He swallowed thickly. The last blow seemed to have knocked some sense into him; he started answering Dorian’s questions in between updating her.

“I’m fine. This guy telegraphs so much, you can see his sucker punches from a mile away. He just hit me with his fucking computer. I figured the coffee cup would be next, but I don’t think the DRN is going to let him keep doing this…..Tasha?” She realized that he couldn’t hear her, that that popping noise had been his receiver being destroyed.

She strained to make out the conversation going on over Clint's head as the two policemen discovered the broken ear piece. She realized with relief that of all the components of the device, the receiver was the least damaging of the three to fall into enemy hands. The receiver did contain some specialized interpretation routines, but it mostly functioned as a standard signal receiver. She was still considering this when Clint made a comment revealing that he knew at least something about Kennex's synthetic leg.

Well, there probably wasn't going to be any convincing John that he didn't have a member of Insyndicate in custody now. She just hoped that didn't occur to him until Clint was in the wind. She said, “The fuck, Clint? How would some random thief know about that!? Shut it! I’m almost there,” before remembering that he couldn’t hear her.

There was a _hurk_ sound and she guessed that John had just yanked him out of the chair.  Clint had been in there with them less than twenty minutes. How the fuck had it gotten so bad so fast?

She assumed an attitude of distracted nonchalance and entered the room with her back to the men as if she expected to find the room empty. She kept her head down and even bothered to correct Kennex when he fucked up her name, before daring to look at her partner as the detective released his shirt and dropped the chair back to the floor.

Clint looked up at her dully. She was prepared to see him roughed up a little, but this was bad. Really bad. His left eye was starting to swell shut and neither eye looked particularly focused. Blood from his lower lip stained his teeth and was smeared from his nose to his shirt collar.

She’d seen far worse, but, despite the graphic sounds she heard over her receiver, she hadn’t expected this level of brutality, even with Kennex’s reputation for excessive force.

Someone was going to get very, very hurt for this.

Dorian politely asked her to leave and she barely remembered to answer as Emma. She forced herself to look like she was trying and failing to be defiant. Her hands itched for the wicked carbide-ceramic blades hidden in her sensible shoes. Emma’s stammering came more natural than usual as she pretended to focus on the A/V equipment and not her bleeding partner. Forcing down all other emotions, she held incredulity in her eyes as she stared down the imposing detective.

When the DRN walked Clint from the room, she saw the raw, red marks where the cuffs had cut him and the bruises on his hands and had to quickly look away. As he tried to make reassuring small talk, she found her gaze drifting to the line of Kennex’s throat; she could have her stiletto in her hand and across his neck quicker than even the android could react.

She stood in the empty room, shaking with fury, her eyes fixed on the blood on the floor and on the handle of the abandoned coffee mug until Clint spoke through their now-one-way communications channel.

“I’m ok,” he was very hard to understand, either from his injuries or from trying to minimize any distinct motions.

She unthinkingly pressed her finger to her ear to try and hear him better and then was suddenly glad the AV equipment out; she’d already called enough attention to herself and any available records of this encounter would be reviewed. She left her ladder and cart and hurried to her desk to prepare his release.

Maybe Captain would insist Clint stay in the city for a few more days. He might be safer going to ground in her apartment until the heat his escape was going to generate dissipated. He could help her when it was time to sneak "CrispenX" back into the city.

“I can’t hear you,” he reminded. “Knocked my receiver out. I think your boyfriend is planning to patch me up before returning me to holding. So give me a few minutes. Don’t kill them, ok? I’ve got an idea. But, please, get my ass out of here.”

* * *

As the adrenaline ebbed from his system, Clint really started to hurt. The whole left side of his face throbbed, his shoulder was close to dislocated and his hands and wrists felt so swollen, he wasn’t sure if he’d be able to fire an arrow for days. The pain in his jaw increased steadily as he ground his teeth against the rage spiking in his chest.

Dorian the DRN led him discreetly through a narrower, less-used corridor. Clint called him on it. “Don’t care if your human beats on me, but you don’t want anyone to see what he did?” he challenged.  

Dorian ignored his comment and guided him to a single-occupant bathroom and locked the door.

The transmitter component in his left ear also functioned as a hearing aid, but not as well so everything sounded distant and muffled. In the close confines of the small tiled room, he couldn’t risk trying to communicate with his partner. The synthetic officer was far too perceptive.

“Go ahead and get washed up,” the DRN offered kindly. He turned him and released the cuffs from his hands. Clint examined the bloody ridges on his wrists and stiffly worked his shoulders.

“Good cop, then?” Clint quipped.

Blue lights crawled around Dorian’s face. _Ew. What was up with that? Who the hell designed that feature?_ It was unpleasant on the clearly artificial MXs; it was down-right disturbing on the far more naturalistic DRN.

“If you were Insyndicate, you’d still be in that chair,” Dorian said solemnly. “But I think you know more about them than you’re saying.”

The android subtly shifted to block the door while maintaining a pleasant aspect. Clint watched him warily. Unarmed, without the element of surprise, he knew he had very little chance of subduing the DRN even if he wanted to. The vulnerability of this new situation galled him even more than being cuffed to the chair. Infuriating John Kennex and withholding information the man desperately wanted was satisfying by comparison.

He couldn’t perturb this detective who had the audacity to be kind to him, even if he suspected he had Connects’s welfare in mind much more than his own. Even in this system of nearly absolute police power, beating the shit out of suspects was generally frowned upon; it forcibly reminded the general populace of all they had lost in the past thirty years.

“John isn’t done questioning you," Dorian warned him, "but I won't let him take it this far again.”

“Is that supposed to be reassuring?”

 

“Tell him what you know about Insyndicate. Anything would be helpful; they are dangerous. I think you know that.”

“There seems to be a lot of dangerous people around here,” he answered ambiguously.

Dorian looked at him hard, like he didn’t know if Clint was making at threat, condemning the police or both.

“Gotta tell you," Clint continued, "this is the shittiest medical ward I’ve ever been to. And I’ve been…” he caught himself before revealing more. _What the hell?_ Connects must have hit him harder than he thought. He was glad for the moment that Natasha didn’t have an open line into his head; he'd had just about all the abuse he could stomach for one day.

He drew his shirt over his head, trying to hide the effort it took to do so without disturbing anything that hurt, bled or twinged. Wincing, he scrubbed his face and neck briskly and slurped water from his cupped hands to rinse his mouth. The pinkish water swirled down the drain, surging over the porcelain each time he spat. He probed his teeth with his tongue and decided they were all still more or less anchored.

Current surged through blue tracery in Dorian’s face again as the android impassively studied him; probably scanning and cataloging every scar his life had ground into his skin. He felt very aware of the unmistakable story it told and the secrets it revealed.

“You were a soldier,” he said with certainty. “You have injuries consistent with advanced interrogation techniques used in the Russian conflict of 2030.”

Clint snorted at the term “advanced interrogation techniques.” Fucking call it what it was.

As if reading his mind, Dorian said, “You’ve been tortured. Is that how you lost your hearing?”

“Yeah, they hit me in the head with a cheap computer.” Clint rubbed cold water on the back of his neck and in his hair, wanting to rinse the last 24 hours off as much as the blood.

“I’m sorry. That was intrusive.”

“Little bit,” Clint nodded while gingerly blotting the water from his face and neck with the  rough paper towels, “little bit.”

“May I disinfect your wounds? Sorry if it’s a little low-tech.” He soaked a cotton ball in some antiseptic liquid and held it over the cut above Clint’s eyebrow. “This might sting a little.”

T _his might **sting?** Was he fucking serious?_ The facial swelling hadn’t gotten bad enough to obscure Clint’s look of confused derision.

Fuck! It _did_ sting!

When the android detective came at him with a bandage, Clint jerked away irritably. He could put on his own goddamn Band-aid. Dorian placidly allowed him to take it and smooth it over the ugly slash on his brow.

As he lowered his hand, Dorian seized his forearm in an easy but unyielding grip and examined the wounds on his wrist. “Let me wrap those before I put the cuffs back on.”

Clint acquiesced, offering his inner wrists where the damage was considerably worse. The DRN’s touch was indistinguishable from human skin as his fingertips rested lightly on the backs of Clint’s hands while he studied the raw marks and the callouses and ridges on his fingers.

“Your heart rate stayed even the whole time you were being questioned. You are no stranger to interrogation. Were you a sniper? Your hands are…”

“Just wrap my goddamn wrists and take me back to lock-up. You can stop fishing.”

Dorian shrugged and wound the gauze - too tight  - before returning the supplies to the small kit and tucking it under the sink.

“You just store that in here? Make a habit of cleaning up his messes?”

Dorian pursed his lips as if he couldn’t wait to relinquish him back to lock-up as he handed Clint back his shirt.

“Look, Detective…” Clint began.

Dorian quickly interrupted, “I’m not a detective.”

Clint blinked at him, trying to assess if he had interpreted correctly. “Aren’t you Connects’s partner?”

“Yes, I am, but…”

“If you are not a detective…. what are you?”

“I’m DRN-0167.”

Clint snorted and shook his head, chewing on a smirk as he pulled his shirt on.

“I’m sorry that amuses you,” Dorian said.

Clint looked at him accusingly. “You know that that’s bullshit, right?” he said. “Jesus. It’s not funny at all. You serve just as blindly and you don’t….” he knew Natasha was yelling at him to shut up again. _What the fuck do you care, Barton? Just get back to lock-up so I can get you the fuck out of here_ , he imagined her saying. But it wasn’t fair. Not content with oppressing the general populace, they had started manufacturing people indistinguishable from the organic ones to subjugate.

“Now who’s playing good cop?”

Clint shrugged. _Participate in your own mistreatment._

“I don’t know who you are or what you are really doing here, but I do know one thing, you aren't a petty thief. You are a professional, and I'm going to get to the bottom of it."

"You mean your human will, right? You aren't a detective, remember?"

Dorian clamped the cuffs back on, not trying to avoid the gauze or the scrapes underneath.

* * *

He was waiting for her when she got home that night. The final few hours had been interminable; she was glad she had stashed what he’d need after his release that morning. He’d easily found the bag with the clothes and Face Maker holographic projector where she’d left it and been able to spend afternoon changing faces and changing trains until he was reasonably sure they could no longer track him.

She let him pull her into an embrace and wound her arms around his back, squeezing him tightly; she kissed him hard and full on the mouth.

She sincerely hoped both hurt like hell.

Unself-consciously releasing his grip on the towel around his waist, he swiped at his re-injured lip with the corner of the terry cloth and began to root through the fruits of her hasty shopping trip.

“Go put some clothes on, Barton.”

“Are you going to make me dinner?” he asked brightly. When she cocked an eyebrow at him, he grumbled “I was going to make dinner for you…well, before your robot boyfriend arrested me.” He winced dramatically when he gathered the bags and put them up on the counter. “Hey, this is just first aid and junk food….and granola and almond milk.”

“There is coffee, too,” she said, somewhat defensive. “You know I don’t cook. There are menus in the drawer,” indicating the nearest one.

“Found them. I actually ordered already. Hope you don’t mind a bacon cheeseburger.”

A knock on the door signaled the arrival of dinner and he headed to the bedroom to retrieve his clothes. “You’ll need to get that. I don’t have my bitstick anymore.”   

 

“So, I’m just supposed to stay here?” Clint stretched out on her couch after tossing the food cartons; she tried not to be annoyed when he brushed cookie crumbs off his shirt and onto the floor.

She nodded. “Captain wants us both on this side at least until Nico is ready to come back over.”

“Was there much trouble convincing him to go over to do the job?”

“No. The bigger problem is going to be getting him to not tell his hacker buddies about it.”

Clint shrugged. “He’s gotta get back here first….”

She regarded him with surprise. Life hadn’t eradicated her partner's lingering idealism thus far. The idea of repaying a favor with a shallow grave beyond the wall seemed out of character.

He correctly surmised her interpretation of his statement. “Shit, Nat, I'm not a monster. I just thought he’d consider staying. We could use a competent full time hacker."

Funny, she'd been considering the former course of action.

He managed to find an old movie with terrible special effects made ten years before he was born and coaxed her on to the couch with him.

Forty-five minutes in, he asked, "Did you get ice cream?” He knew damn well that she had and looked at her expectantly. She quirked an eyebrow at him.

“But, I’m injured,” he protested. When she stayed curled up against him, he added, “If you’d spent the night in jail and gotten smacked around by  Dirty Harry and his T-1000, I’d get it for you.”

That certainly was true.

“Hope vanilla is ok.”

“Always is,” he said.

“Seems like the department probably goes through a lot of tablets. I doubt that Connects’s will every be working again.”  A red splotch had blossomed in his left eye, emphasizing both the bright blue of his irises and this morning’s ordeal. Handing him the bowl, she resumed her position at his side as he grabbed a handful of Oreos and mashed them into the ice cream.

“He broke his weeks ago. That was probably Detective Paul’s. They are pretty sturdy. That one probably has a few more interrogations in it.”

“Thanks,” he said, absorbed in his ice cream and the movie with its techno-soundtrack.

“For what?”

“For getting me out of there. After the MX walked me out, I couldn’t stop thinking about Danny and Bobbi… These assholes. Nothing is going to happen to them for what they did today. I’m pretty sure he does that all the time. And you are right, its nothing like what the Feds can do.”

“It’s why we do what we do,” she reminded quietly.

  
  


Her lecture could wait until tomorrow; one of their best bit cloners was in the hands of the department’s most capable technologist. Yes, the SV receiver was broken, but with enough time, Dr. Lom might stumble on to some of it’s secrets. It would have been a disaster if either officer had been callous enough to take Clint’s other hearing aid. Losing a functional transmitter would assure they could never really trust the SV again.

For now, however, while Clint slept, she had other ways to extinguish her anger. Kennex’s glass terrarium of an apartment might just be the easiest thing she'd ever staked out.

It was really a shame she’d promised the Captain to wait until any action was sanctioned; but that didn’t mean she couldn’t gather the necessary intel in the mean time.

 


	6. Benedict Android by Readithoney

Rudy looked morosely up at the two men clanging down the set of metal stairs that led to the deep belly of his lab. The broody technician glanced up at them with the sleep-starved eyes of a struggling genius. Even before they reached him, John knew the news wouldn’t be good.

“It hasn’t even been 24 hours, John,” Rudy said, focusing back on his work, repairing an MX with a laceration on his chest from a bullet charge.

Dorian looked down at the MX on the table and the two regarded each other silently.

“This doesn’t look like a cell phone,” John gestured to the MX.

“I actually work for the precinct, John,” Rudy said, pulling a piece of shrapnel out of the android in front of him.   

“Did you make any headway?” John asked, poking at the MX’s wound and getting his hand slapped.

“Hands off.” Rudy snapped, “The encryption is solid; whoever locked it doesn’t want it unlocked.”

“And the listening device?” John asked.

“Hearing aid?” Rudy corrected, “Again, I’m not sure. I haven’t had the proper time.”  

“Playing holochess?” John smirked.

“No actually,” Rudy said, adjusting a light on his forehead and leaning over his patient, “You kept Dorian overnight so I just worked.” He turned his head to give the detective a look, satisfied that the smirk washed off of John’s face.

“Would it help to get the other hearing aid?” Dorian asked.

Both men looked at him. John barked, “What other hearing aid?”

“He had one in his left ear, too,” Dorian said simply, “I saw it when I...when I took him back to processing. It seemed cruel to take it, though.”

John’s eyebrows pulled into a hard, angry ridge. He gestured to the exit, “Let’s go get it then, fuck! Maybe we can get him to unlock the phone.”

Dorian turned to follow John and Rudy cleared his throat. “Dorian, you were in combat not two days ago. And I’ve yet to examine you. Can you stay a moment?”

Rudy patted the MX on the shoulder and said, “This won’t take long.” The MX stared blankly at the ceiling.

John groaned and said, “I’ll head up and pull Barton. Meet me when you’re done.”

He clanked up the stairs and out of Rudy’s lab, shaking his head.

. . . . . .

John knocked on the counter at holding and said, “Pull Clint Barton for me, will ya?”

“Good morning, Detective,” Delores, the woman behind the counter murmured, tacking at the lightscreen, “No one under the name Barton here.”

“That’s right,” John said, bumping the heel of his palm into the side of his head, “His name is David Archer.”

She tapped away then shifted her eyes at Kennex, “Says here, released yesterday.”

“Nope, wrong,” John said, “It’s spelled D-A-V-I-D, A-R-”

“I know how to spell,” Delores said flatly. She turned the screen so John could see, a 3D model of Clint Barton spun slowly, under the name ARCHER, DAVID. “He was released yesterday afternoon by DRN0167. Your partner, right?”

“Are you sure?” John asked through his teeth, “I really need you to be sure.”

“We don’t have him anymore,” she said, deadpan, clearly wishing the conversation over, “His holding cell has already been filled.”

John smacked the counter, making the woman blink and several people turn to look at him. He beamed his eyes around the room and took off down the glassy corridor.

John ducked into a bathroom and twisted thelock, leaning his shoulders into the heavy metal door.

His mind was reeling with this information. How could Dorian let Barton go?

He probed his mind for reasons and narrowed it down to two possible solutions. One, Dorian was worried about the possible ramifications of the rough interrogation. Fearful that the detective would be suspended or forced to work with a more controlling MX partner. He knew Dorian had been uncomfortable with the questioning process, he told him as much in the curry shop. The second option was that Dorian thought he was protecting John from something. Maybe he was afraid of what would happen if John got too close to Insyndicate; if he was able to face Anna.

The more he thought about it, the more unacceptable it became that Dorian would step over his head like this and free a dangerous criminal.

As far as John was concerned, an agent of Insyndicate had been in his grasp and Dorian aided him in making an escape. He felt all the rage he’d harbored since the day he lost his leg build up and boil out.

. . . . . . .

John slammed into Rudy’s lab, the door kicking back against the wall, startling everyone below. He leaned over the railing, pointing a finger at Dorian, “You!” he shouted, nearly tumbling down the stairs.

Dorian observed as John seethed closer. “What is wrong, John?”

John approached Dorian and shoved him with both his hands. It was unexpected and the DRN stumbled back into one of the long, skinny metal tables stacked with Rudy’s tools and machines. There was a terrible cacophony as metal bounced to the floor and glass shattered in all directions, knocked around by the android as he collided with Rudy’s work space.

Rudy observed in silent horror.

John was unphased and charged Dorian again, his fist making hard contact with the android’s jaw.

“Ow, fuck!” John shouted, turning around and cradling his hand. The knuckles bled profusely from tearing against the titanium frame.

A purple gash on Dorian’s chin went unnoticed by the bot, who seemed deeply concerned with his human’s injury, “John, are you okay?” He attempted to get the cursing man to hold still, trying to see his hand which rained blood on the concrete floor.

John whirled on him, knocking him back against the table again and sending more equipment to the floor. Rudy ran over and saved a priceless gadget that tottered close to the edge. “Stop!” he begged.

John wound his fist in Dorian’s shirtfront, yanking him close, bleeding all over him, “You released him?”

Dorian looked utterly confused and his face brightened blue as he checked the precinct databanks. Much to his surprise, he discovered that he did, in fact, release Barton the day before--at least that is what the report proclaimed. However, he knew for a fact that he had done no such thing. “John,” he began, but John was too mad.

John lunged again but Dorian wasn’t going to let him pummel his hands any further. He trapped John’s flailing wrist and grabbed at the hand on his shirt, as well.

“Where can I hit him so it’ll hurt?” John demanded of Rudy, struggling against Dorian’s iron grip.

“Outside?” Rudy suggested furiously, stooping to gather the remnants of his work station from the rubble all over the floor.

Dorian walked John up against the wall and pinned him in place where he could do no more damage to Rudy’s lab. Rudy was beside himself in the background.

“I didn’t release Barton,” the DRN said evenly and low near to John’s ear, “I realize it says that I did, but you need to believe me, John. I took him to get cleaned up and dropped him back in the cells.”

John exhaled hard, his mouth a jagged gap as he breathed heavily. “He was Insyndicate,” he huffed, “Fuck.”

Dorian dared let John go and watched him slump against the wall. The android attempted to inspect the open knuckle on John’s hand but the detective yanked from his grip.

As if resigning to the fact that the lab was trashed, Rudy walked over to inspect Dorian’s chin. The synthetic skin had been sloughed back, but no other damage was apparent. He drew a soft-soldering tool from his apron pocket and sealed the skin back together, leaving a slightly purple scar in its place. “I’ll fix you up better later,” Rudy said, his face an utter scowl.

John was already on his way out. Dorian felt torn between his desire to follow John and his obligation to help Rudy in the lab.

Rudy followed Dorian’s eyes to the gruff detective’s path, solemn realization passing over him. “Go,” he said softly to Dorian, and then he pointed and added more bluntly at John, “Get out! I don’t want to see either of you for a good long while!”

“I should help with this mess we’ve made,” Dorian argued.

Rudy couldn’t maintain any anger toward Dorian. He shook his head gently, “I have an army of MXs for that,” he gave the DRN’s arm a squeeze, “Hurry and catch up, or he’s like to leave you here.”

Dorian smiled kindly at Rudy. “I will make this up to you,” he determined and then darted up the stairs to catch up with John.

Rudy watched him go and then turned to the debris of his laboratory and pulled on his hair with both fists.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                

. . . . . . .

It took some convincing, but Dorian was finally able to wrap the bloodied hand of his partner while they went over the facts in his apartment. John was convinced of two things: Clint Barton was an agent of Insyndicate and someone inside the precinct was working for the underground criminal organization.

John jerked his hand out of Dorian’s grip as he dabbed the wound with antiseptic. “Fucking stings,” he complained.

Dorian smiled and wrapped his knuckle with gauze. “I wouldn’t release anyone without your consent,” the android said thoughtfully, conversationally.

“I know,” John frowned at his partner, “Sorry I hit you.”

Dorian poked at the light screen on the coffee table and pulled up the release report for David Archer. It listed that Archer had spent the morning with cyber crimes and was released by Dorian a few hours later. Nothing in the report stated that John or Dorian had interrogated the man and no footage was filed from Cyber. All security footage in the precinct was missing for nearly the entire day and the evidence warehouse no longer held the bows and arrows.  

“This identity will be scrubbed,” John said, “Make sure to keep your files Dorian. I’m going to hunt that asshole down.”

John looked at the city through the picture windows that surrounded his apartment. The water of the bay around him and the cityscape that scratched at the sky. Somewhere, out there, was that fucking, bow and arrow wielding, cocky, bastard. John was glad he got a few good hits in while he could.

. . . . . . . . . .

In the week since Clint Barton’s escape from the precinct, John grew wary and suspicious. He knew someone had to be working on the inside, and it wasn’t the first time he suspected a leak. Dorian caught the detective’s eyes narrowing and darting, looking at his coworkers with suspicion and unease.

Knowing that this could only get worse, he suggested they knock off early and grill out on John’s deck, a wooden platform connected to the bedroom of John’s apartment, surrounded by the bay. John liked the idea, needed a way to rest his mind and quell the thundering migraine that chased him all through the week.

Dorian watched a steak on the grill while John sucked a beer and lounged back on a weathered adirondack. The sun was still out and John wore sunglasses and enjoyed the breeze. This was one of the few balmy weeks that separated the months of chill.

Dorian gestured to a bowl of fruit on the table, “It’s not just for decoration, man.” He smiled, flipping John’s steak.

John gave in and plucked a pear out of the bowl. It was washed and still felt a little cold from the refrigerator. He gave it a quick shine on the shoulder of his shirt and then raised it to his mouth and sunk his teeth in.

As he pulled at the flesh of the fruit, a sharp whistling sound passed by his face, ripping the fruit from his grasp and leaving his hand in the air and a chunk of pear in his teeth. Not a split second later, Dorian had tackled him painfully to the deck, covering him.

John caught his breath and looked up at the wall above him. The pear was stuck to the window frame with a very familiar arrow, still vibrating softly from the impact. “Get off me,” John said, shoving at Dorian who looked around before letting him up. John sprung to his feet and searched in all directions. There was nothing nearby, no boats in the bay. He scoured everything in his vision and couldn't tell where the arrow had come from.

Gripped onto the detective with iron fingers, Dorian pulled him back with force, shielding him. “Go inside, John,” he insisted.

John ignored his android, eyes searching every possibility. He knew Clint Barton was perched nearby, smirking arrogantly. No more arrows whistled through the air. One had been enough. It was clear to both John and Dorian that the arrow had found its target perfectly. Had Barton wanted to kill John, he’d be pinned to the wall instead of the pear.  

Dorian’s face flashed, “Based on the trajectory, there is only one area this arrow could have been fired from, but it would be impossible to fire that distance with this accuracy. I’m sending units to check the area, anyhow.”

“He’ll be gone,” John said, glowering out at the improbable perch.

Dorian turned his attention to the arrow. “I believe Barton is trying to tell you something.”

Tearing the fruit from the frame, John examined the arrowhead that was buried deep in the wood around the window. The juice from the pear was smattered across deck and house like blood at a crime scene. “Yeah, I think I got it,” John growled, tossing the eviscerated fruit into the bay. 


	7. Lucky by DJLiopleurodon

Within three minutes of receiving Natasha's text, Clint had the med-kit and all the dressings laid out on the kitchen table. He spent the remaining 15 minutes composing increasingly hostile missives to Cap in his head and thinking of new and inventive tortures for John Kennex.

He probably wasn't the one who had shot her, but Clint was certain Connects was responsible for it one way or another.

Normal people paced when the nervous energy threatened to overwhelm them. Snipers like Clint grew still; the energy coiling inward, his muscles straining against themselves until they ached.

Natasha's foot steps changed a few yards from the door; the promise of safety draining caution and deliberation. He opened the door and ushered her in, his gun in his off hand just out of sight of any stray neighbors.

She pursed her lips and drew her brows in annoyance and it took him a beat to realize her anger was directed at herself and at the shallow furrow across her shoulder blade.

"Got lucky with that one," she observed, "that was close."

Bastard got lucky alright.

Lucky to have tagged her at all.

Lucky she'd been ordered not to engage.

Lucky to not have done enough damage that she'd forgotten that directive.

Lucky she'd been alone, without the sort of backup that tended to ignore directives that entailed not shooting the shit out of anyone who hurt his partner.

Yeah. Someone got damn lucky tonight.

He guided her into the chair and cut away her soaked clothing. He frowned as he peeled back the black mesh. "Ok. This looks bad. Nat, this is a lot of blood,"

"Please. It's a flesh wound."

"I've seen arterial bleeds that didn't gush like this."

"You have not. Just patch me up so I can shower. I have to work in the morning."

"Like hell."

"Yeah, because that wouldn't be suspicious."

Unable to explain how anyone would connect dorky Emma from IT's sick-day with the mysterious shadow that interrupted the black market transaction, he returned his attention to her injury.

"The blood they have on file isn't mine; even if they managed to find the trail, they'd never match it. We prepared for this. I've got some True-Type capsules in the kit. I'll be bleeding Emma's blood within four hours. Stop worrying. You sound like an old woman."

"Which one of them got you?"

"I don't know." She recounted the clusterfuck as he worked, articulations of pain restricted to the changing tension in her voice. He must have been doing a good job if she was making such an effort not to curse at his endeavors. Not only had neither dealer nor buyer showed up at the drop, Dorian and Kennex had been there waiting to apprehend the buyers and sellers.

"Was it a set-up?" he asked.

"No," she wrinkled her brow as she reconsidered the thought that had dogged her as soon as she spotted them. "They were as confused as I was."

The colony could survive without the organic supplement replicator, but it would have helped. Their growing numbers were increasingly hard to support and their hydroponics and greenhouses increasingly hard to hide from the drones. They needed medical supplies and security and their uneasy affiliation with the lower rungs of organized crimes would soon become dependence and complicity if they weren't able to supply, protect and arm themselves.

Between the warring crime rings and the new threat of Dr. Vaughn's marauding android armies, the colony faced raids and annihilation everyday. Those defending the colony could only do so much; statistically, sheer numbers, brute force and time win every time unless you stayed ahead in the game.

Vaughn left them alone generally, but everyone beyond the wall was competing for the same limited resources. In securing their own channel to the city's power grid, the colony had just become a new target. Funds and resources previously dedicated to procuring medical supplies were now needed for security. Supplies were low and a medical printer was fast becoming a necessity. The raw materials could be obtained at a tenth of the cost of the rendered chemicals. People without Nat and Steve's accelerated physiology, people like Tony and Clint himself and all the refugees for whom they had, inadvertently, become responsible, had no other access to medicines.

People had settled in, were building lives, having children, being reunited with loved ones as more people fled the oppressive technological regime for the freedom beyond the wall without regard to the fact that technology was just about the only thing standing between them and a quick death in the crossfire of the constant turf wars.

Well, technology, and the Defenders, that is.

Clint finished smoothing the tape over the gauze and neatly repacked the kit before glancing up to find her studying him over her shoulder. "I should have been with you tonight," he said heatedly. "Why am I here if I'm not allowed to leave the apartment?"

"You aren't allowed to leave because you had to play Wilhelm Tell with John Kennex."

"An action I deeply regret," he said solemnly.

"Bullshit. You regret that I put it in the report," she countered. She stood and tested his work, wincing as the motion pulled at the wound. She smiled at his questioning expression and nodded appreciation. He knew she'd forgiven him the rash parting shot; the piece of fruit was just too tempting and they had thought their involvement with Kennex and his DRN was at an end.

And it was a fucking impressive display of marksmanship.

Steve hadn't been nearly as amused or indulgent as she had and their captain had "suggested" Clint keep a much lower profile for the time being.

He watched her contemplate the least painful course of action before deciding that she probably would accept help in removing her clothes. After unlacing her boots so she could toe them off, he flicked out his knife and deliberately drew it across the other shoulder seam and remaining bra strap. He leaned into her when she stepped out of the ruined mess and slid her good arm around his back and pretended not to be thinking about the fact that she wore only a scant pair of black panties or that she smelled far better than she had any right to.

"I should have been there," he said again, more quietly.

She relaxed against him for a second before stiffening again. She seemed to take stock of her bloodied state but once she realized he wasn't reacting negatively, she slumped back into him. "I'm just glad you are still here," she confessed against his t-shirt.

"Me too. You know I can't come back after this," he said, regretting the statement as soon as it left his mouth.

"You shouldn't be here at all," she looked away in a very un-Nat like gesture. "It's not safe for you, Clint. They know who you _are_." As the knowledge that the re-activated DRN held information they had paid so much to obliterate gnawed at her, she grew more and more anxious to return him to base even as she didn't want him to leave. Keeping him grounded until their final mission served as a good compromise.

"I wouldn't be if Nico wasn't so into playing Neo in Zion."

"Neo?"

"That movie... from the other night... Shit, Nat, you make me feel old sometimes."

She kissed him lightly on the lips. "Get me some juice, will you? You might be right. I lost a lot of blood; I'm pretty woozy."

He handed her two protein bars, some iron supplements, a couple of True-Types coded for her cover and a mostly-full carton of orange juice.

She regarded the open spout. "You've been drinking straight from the carton," she observed with an accusing eyebrow.

He shrugged back at her. "And? It's probably too late to be thinking about cooties."

Not bothering to concede the obvious, she knocked back the pills and a generous portion of the juice and began dutifully chewing on the dense bars while he bagged the bloody rags and eyed her legs.

"Think we are going to try again or lay low until we get our real orders?"

He pulled his tactical mind back from his impure thoughts. "What?"

"You know Cap must have a bigger plan," she prompted, "some reason he hasn't brought you back to base. It's not just to wait for Nico. He isn't telling us yet, but it has to be something."

"Because it isn't finished," Clint surmised. "When is the last time Steve gave you a plan that wasn't 100 percent complete?"

"Never."

"Right. He wants us to think he just comes up with them perfect the first time. This one is taking awhile, though."

"Well, whatever it is, we can't keep letting the precinct interfere. If they are getting the same intel we are, this is going to be a problem," she concluded.

"You know what Steve's solution will be, don't you?" he grumbled dubiously.

"Yeah," she blew out a sigh. "I'm pretty sure that's been the plan all along. Or at least since he started getting my reports."

"Goddammit. This means I don't get to kick Connect's ass, doesn't it?"

"Probably." She nudged him wryly. "But, then again, Kennex is so pissed at you, you might not have a choice. You really shouldn't have shot at him."


	8. Paranoid Android by Readithoney

Kennex stopped running once it was clear the person in the rafters had escaped. He leaned his hand on his knee and holstered his weapon in a way that telegraphed his annoyance.

"I can't believe she still escaped after you shot her."

John stood up stiffly and rubbed at his lower back. He gave a strained look to Dorian before grumbling, "Well, the tip was right." They walked back through the dark warehouse.

"Should we stick around and wait for the dealer?" John asked, crouching by a thick drip of blood from the wounded perp and looking up at Dorian. "Though, I doubt they'll show, now."

Dorian nodded, putting a hand on John's shoulder, "Let's call it in."

* * *

Truth be told, ever since the archer managed to escape his clutches, John Kennex had been a ball of frayed nerves. He carried his frustration and stress in his shoulders and back. He was irritable and short and far less willing to work with anyone but Dorian and on anything but his obsession with locating Barton and bringing him to justice. The files Dorian found on his hard drive that allowed him to identify the man had no further data other than a long lost facial identity log.

Even when John pressed Dorian to dig deeper in his files, the DRN informed him that there was nothing more to be said on Clint Barton.

John's reputation was suffering in the precinct and Maldonado had ordered him back into anger management, which did very little to improve his mood. He sat at his desk, turning the arrow he'd been studying closely in his hands and studying it.

"Any more leads today?" Dorian asked, knowing full well the answer. He was drawing John out of the walled garden of his mind.

"No," John said, dropping the arrow with a clatter, then massaging his fingers deep into his over-tired eyes. "Trust me, if there was, I wouldn't be sitting here."

"Kennex, my office," Maldonado said as she strode past, her mood was imperceptible as always. "You too, Dorian."

Once inside, the small but forceful captain said, "Last night you busted a heist of one of the organic meal supplement printers."

John wasn't sure if it was a question or a statement so he nodded curtly.

"You said you fired several rounds and one connected," She was asking questions she already knew the answers to. John was curious if this would end in a lecture or a congratulations.

Dorian chimed in, "I've checked all the hospital logs and continue to do so, looking for a woman with a similar wound"

She nodded, "Anything come up?"

John opened his fool mouth, "Would we be here if that was the case?"

Maldonado gave him a hard look, "John, you've failed to perform your basic duties since the day that archer got away. I know you think he's Insyndicate, but you have no proof. How much longer do you plan to haunt the halls of my precinct with this attitude?"

John didn't have an answer.

"You'll get over it or I'll put you on leave until you do, understood?"

John nodded, his face a scowl.

The captain looked at him hard, "Do you need to go talk to the psychologist?"

John's eyes flashed a series of emotions like a slot machine, traveling from murderous to upset to pleading to pleasant. "No, Captain, I'm fine. I promise, I'll get my head back in the game."

"Good," Maldonado said, "Go check out the warehouse now that it's daytime and John," She paused long enough to catch his attention, "I want all these  _tips_  you're getting lately to come across my desk the moment they hit yours. No exceptions. You act on a tip like that without backup again, I'll take your badge."

John hid his hurt feelings behind a mask of stoic rage. "Yes, captain," he managed then turned to make his exit. He snapped up his coat and keys and Dorian followed him from the building.

Dorian got in the passenger side of the cruiser and waited for it. Waited for John to erupt in an expletive laced rant about Maldonado, the precinct, Insyndicate, Barton, the world, anything. However, he got in the car and slumped his shoulders silently. Dorian was about ready to tell him that perhaps there was more on Barton in his files, when the perky IT girl was knocking on John's window.

John looked up and rolled down the window in surprise, "Alice," he smiled.

Her face fell in disgust. John waved a hand and chuckled, "I'm kidding, Emma, I know your name."

She smiled at him. It seemed a little forced to Dorian. "I just wanted to ask if you wanted to have coffee or dinner sometime," she leaned forward into the window, her white, ample breasts right by his face.

Dorian looked away.

"Wha-uh-yeah!" John said, "hell yeah, that would be great."

"Thursday night?" she asked in a small voice.

"Yeah, yes please!" John said, "Where should I pick you up?"

"Meet me here," she said, handing John a piece of folded paper. The address was written in ink which was beyond unusual and it tugged musically at John's old fashioned heartstrings. She slipped a hand up under his chin, "Don't be late," she smiled and headed back in the station.

John was moon eyed watching her go. She sashayed her hips and looked back at him once with bedroom eyes before disappearing completely.

"Fucking yes," John said, "Did you see the way she was touching me?" He had goose bumps, it had been way too long since he had gotten laid.

"Highly unusual," Dorian remarked but left it at that. Every exchange he had seen with Emma had been timid and her discomfort with John was almost always written cleanly on her face. In their last actual exchange, John had been looming over a bloodied perp in an interrogation room and the girl had looked seriously upset. The sex kitten that just crawled up to the window was a whole different girl. "I don't think you should go," Dorian said.

John was too busy singing to himself, imagining finally getting off with another person. He started up the cruiser and nearly backed them up into moving traffic.

Dorian frowned and glared out the window, his face alive with blue lights. He'd take a ranting, raving, cursing, pissed off John Kennex over this lust-struck idiot any day.

* * *

John was getting ready for his date. It was surprising how his mood had elevated for the rest of the week all because an attractive blond had invited him out out on the town.

Dorian wanted to know where he was going but John had kept the little folded piece of paper close to his person at all times and was very tight-lipped about the location. As John splashed aftershave on himself, the DRN tried one last time, "So where is this place you are meeting her, again?"

"Again?" John asked, smirking at his sulking partner, "I didn't tell you in the first place. Do you know why?" He barely paused a whole beat before continuing and answering his own question, "Because if I did, you'd show up and skulk in the bushes and watch us eat because you think she's dangerous."

"Disingenuous," Dorian corrected.

"Well whatever, man," John said, inspecting himself in the mirror. His hand tapped at his right leg, a nervous gesture John took on when he was feeling self-conscious about his synthetic parts, "Don't stay up." He winked lewdly at the android and headed out the door.

Dorian waited two minutes before heading out as well, hopping in the car with Rudy who was parked around the corner.


	9. The Great Collapse by DJLiopleurodon

"You're home early," Clint observed, pausing mid-push-up. "Not feeling well? Oh, right. You have a fucking gun shot wound."

"Don't be an ass," Natasha chided as she stiffly lowered Emma's battered backpack to the floor and discarded her unnecessary spectacles. She used a rolled up cell-o to slide a full clip, a sticky cereal bowl and a coffee cup to one side of the counter. "Got the rest of our orders." She flicked the documents from her phone to spin out on the countertop vid screen.

He perked up and vaulted to his feet, swiping a towel across his face before dropping it across the back of one of the disrupted kitchen chairs as he began to study the pages.

She surveyed the space and started mentally scrubbing it of any incriminating traces, her brow creasing at the mess. Time as her house-cat hadn't blunted Clint's deadly edge, but he hadn't been neat about it. His weaponry, tools of training, and dishes littered Emma's orderly feminine apartment. Since he was scrupulous about sensitive data, it was just benign clutter, discounting their small arsenal, and Natasha sure as hell wasn't going to pick up after him.

She turned back when he vented a quiet growl.

"It was your idea," she said flatly.

* * *

 

Every single element of the plan pissed Clint off.

Hostile and on edge for days, the orders had pushed him to his breaking point. Each skree of the knife against the whetstone echoed like a curse in the quiet apartment.

He hated how inured they'd both become to Natasha using her body as she was. Trained in seduction from an obscenely young age, it didn't bother her like it bothered him. In fact, she didn't seem to wield her appeal with any more consciousness or begrudgement than any other of her skills.

It didn't mean he wasn't allowed to resent the hell out of it.

He hated their compromises, manipulation and double-dealing. He hated all the necessary evils, the unnecessary caution and the acceptable losses. He hated the privation. He hated each new line they crossed. He hated waiting and he hated hiding. He hated the people that made the world this way.

And, right now, he fucking  _hated_  John Kennex.

The detective served as a stand in for everything he saw wrong with the country, a synecdoche for this new world, right down to the synthetic limb he simultaneously relied on and despised.

Jesus, he needed to get out of this apartment; the confinement was making him philosophic. He needed to shoot something. He began to hone a different blade, drawing out each pass in a long, slow rasp.

He watched Natasha search Emma's wardrobe for a suitable outfit; something sexy enough to distract the detective, but that could conceal her "work clothes" underneath.

Her catsuit wouldn't, as the other night proved, stop a bullet, but it offered more protection than the polyester in Emma's closet.

She finally settled on a blue v-neck blouse and a pair of black pants that simultaneously hugged every curve and hung loose enough to conceal her utilitarian combat boots.

Good to know she wasn't expecting to take off her clothes for Connects.

Clint picked up one of the slim throwing knives and glowered at it before laying into the stone in short, sullen strokes. While he worked he meditated on some of the events that brought them here.

As the weather changed and rising waters forced people inland and the skyrocketing price of fossil fuels turned rural areas and the suburbs into ghost towns, industrial Midwestern cities became major urban centers, each fortified like a feudal citadel. The tech industry moved north and east to these new strongholds as California sank and Texas dried up and blew away in the decades-long drought. Chicago became the new great American metropolis as the deserted canyons of New York City's skyscrapers and crumbling tenements dissolved into the ocean.

Some cities like Toledo, Kansas City and St. Louis, grew affluent on solar cells, synthetic android skin, and gourmet food replicators, respectively. Other cities devoured themselves: Detroit was a smoldering ruin; Buffalo stood abandoned like the set of a apocalypse movie; Oklahoma City lay flat, the whole city just packed it in after the fourth cluster of EF5 tornadoes.

And then, of course, there was New Pittsburgh. The city managed simultaneously to tear itself apart and become one of the most influential and important of the new cities. The city grew wealthy on new steel alloys and android skeletal framework. But, as with everywhere, the paroxysms of the great collapse subsided and the government struggled to regain control. Regimes, militias and saviours rose and fell like flood waters. The government ringed people willing to submit to martial control and left those otherwise inclined to the badlands outside the walled cities.

Eventually, the fortified cities surged against the horizon and the rest of the land decayed into loss and anarchy. Protected rail lines ran between the ensconced cities. Everything else, everything outside the defensible perimeters, became a lawless wasteland.

New Pittsburgh's wall was unique in that it bisected, rather than encompassed, the city. Even as the Iowa DHS shuffled him and his brother through foster care, Clint remembered seeing the riots and resistance to the martial law in Pittsburgh on television. At the time, he thought that as he'd been told, he was just too young to understand. He didn't really understand even when he enlisted in the army 10 years later.

The hearing loss that abruptly ended his military career hadn't been a problem for Stark Industry's security. Clint's dedication and sharp eyes quickly earned him a spot on the CEO's personal security detail, where his glib tongue, fierce loyalty and easy charm won him Tony Stark's trust and respect.

When the genius billionaire philanthropist discovered….. what he discovered—only then did Clint understand. He had been living under a fascist regime; had served a fascist regime. He didn't even have to think twice when Tony asked him to follow him over the wall.

He set the stone aside along with these thoughts and set to work on the quiver at his side. He inspected each arrow; fitting some with new heads, flicking out and replacing damaged fletchings and casting aside irreparable shafts with a clatter.

"Stop sulking," Natasha admonished. "And get your damn feet off the table."

He slid another few fletchings into place before glancing up, eyes shadowed, "Why? Even assuming we don't get killed, we are done here." He dropped his feet back to the floor.

He rolled an arrow through his fingers, inspecting the balance of its anti-MX payload. "This time tomorrow, we'll be over the wall, in body bags or in federal custody….And I'll be goddamned if they'll take me in."

"Which reminds me, I need to take that dye with me when we go," she said, nonchalantly ignoring the thrust of his words. She applied her voce hardware and arranged her hair so it fell in waves around her shoulders. "Or I could dye it back now. You think it would throw John?"

 _John_?! Christ.

"Or you could shave your head," he grunted as he snapped on a new bowstring, "that should keep Rogers from pimping you out again for a while."

His head jerked as the blade thunked into the couch between his knees.

He was still staring at it in stunned silence when she vaulted over the coffee table to settle in front of him.

"Knock it the fuck off!" she said ferociously. "You don't have to like it. There are certainly parts I am not happy about. But you will  _not_ …" She bit back the rest of her words; she knew what else was bothering him, even if he hadn't said it.

He looked back at her, clear-eyed but shame-faced.

"I'm sorry," he said sincerely. "That was over the line. You didn't deserve that. I just hate... I hate everything about this." He yanked the knife out of the upholstery and held it by the blade to offer it to her.

She pressed her lips to his as she took the dagger and set it aside. "Do you think it's going to be easy for me to do cozy up to that Neanderthal after he shot me? After what he did to you?" Clasping his hand, she squeezed it until he met her gaze. "We are doing what we need to do."

"This is wrong, Tash, and you know it."

"I know you think it is," she said gently. "He's just a machine, Clint."

Clint looked at her levelly and she reconsidered her words.

"It.  _It_  is just a machine."


End file.
